Just Sustainable Futures

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Just Sustainable Futures

Gender and Environmental Justice Considerations in Planning

ULRIKA GUNNARSSON-ÖSTLING

DOCTORAL THESIS IN PLANNING AND DECISION ANALYSIS, WITH SPECIALISATION IN URBAN AND REGIONAL STUDIES

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TRITA-SoM 2011-07 ISSN 1653-6126

ISRN KTH/SoM/11-07/SE ISBN 978-91-7501-000-7

Division of Environmental Strategies Research – fms Department of Urban Planning and Environment KTH Architecture and the Built Environment Royal Institute of Technology

100 44 Stockholm

Printed by E-print, Sweden, 2011.

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Abstract

This thesis contributes and deepens knowledge on long-term planning for sustainable development through exploring environmental justice and gender discourses in planning and futures studies. It also suggests ways of working with those issues.

Environmental justice is explored through discussions with planners in Stockholm, Sweden, and through looking at images of future Stockholm and the environmental justice implications of these. These studies show how environmental justice issues can be manifested in a Swedish urban context and discuss how sustainable development and environmental justice can be in- creased, operationalised and politicised in planning. One key contribution of the thesis is in identifying the need to address procedural and outcomes values in both planning and futures studies.

Gender discourses are explored through analysing papers published in the journal Futures and through an examination of Swedish Regional Growth Programmes. The feminist criticism of futures studies mainly relates to the field being male-dominated and male-biased, which means that the future is seen as already colonised by men, that futures studies generally do not work with feminist issues or issues of particular relevance for women, and that they often lack a critical and reflexive perspective. There is therefore a call for feminist futures as a contrast to hegemonic male and Western technology- orientated futures. The case of the Swedish Regional Growth Programmes shows that gender inequality is often viewed as a problem of unequal rights and possibilities. This liberal view on gender equality has made it rather easy for gender equality advocates to voice demands, e.g. for the inclusion of both women and men in decision-making processes, but the traditional male norm is not challenged. If a different response is required, other ways of describing the problem of gender inequalities must be facilitated. One way to open up different ways of describing the problem and to describe desirable futures could be the use of scenarios.

Planning for just, sustainable futures means acknowledging process values, but also content (giving nature a voice!). It also means politicising planning. There are a number of desirable futures, and when this is clarified the political content of planning is revealed. These different images of the future can be evaluated in terms of environmental justice, gender perspective or any specific environmental aspect, e.g. biodiversity, which indicates that different futures are differently good for nature and/or different societal groups.

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Sammanfattning

Den här avhandlingen bidrar till och fördjupar kunskapen om långsiktig planering för hållbar utveckling. Den gör det genom att belysa miljörättvise- och genusdiskurser i planering och framtidsstudier. Den föreslår också sätt att arbeta med dessa frågor.

Miljörättvisa belyses genom diskussioner med planerare i Stockholm och även genom att undersöka framtidsbilder av Stockholms och deras miljörättvise- konsekvenser. De här studierna visar både hur miljörättvisefrågor kan mani- festeras i en svensk urban kontext och diskuterar hur hållbar utveckling och miljörättvisa kan få ökad betydelse, operationaliseras och politiseras i planeringen. Ett viktigt bidrag med den här avhandlingen är att påpeka behovet av att adressera både processuella värden och resultat av planering och framtidsstudier.

Genusdiskurser utforskas genom att analysera artiklar som publicerats i tidskriften Futures och genom en undersökning av de svenska regionala till- växtprogrammen. Den feministiska kritiken av framtidsstudier handlar framför- allt om att fältet är mansdominerat och fokuserar traditionellt manliga frågor, framtiden ses därför som redan koloniserad av män. Dessutom påpekas att framtidsstudier i allmänhet inte jobbar med feministiska frågor eller frågor av särskild betydelse för kvinnor, att framtidsstudier ofta saknar ett kritiskt och reflexivt perspektiv och att det finns en efterfrågan av feministiska framtider som en kontrast till hegemoniskt manliga, västerländskt och teknologiskt in- riktade framtider. Fallet med de svenska regionala tillväxtprogrammen visar att ojämställdhet ofta ses som ett problem av ojämlika rättigheter och möjligheter.

Denna liberala syn på jämställdhet har gjort det ganska lätt för jämställdhets- förespråkare att kräva och ge röst för krav som att både kvinnor och män ska inkluderas i beslutsprocesser, men den traditionella manliga normen ifrågasätts sällan. Om andra lösningar önskas, måste andra sätt att beskriva problemet med bristande jämställdhet underlättas. Ett sätt att öppna upp för olika sätt att beskriva problemet och även sätt att beskriva önskvärda framtider skulle kunna vara användning av scenarier.

Planering för en rättvis hållbar framtid innebär ett erkännande processuella värden, men även av själva resultatet (ge naturen en röst!). Det innebär också att politisera planeringen. Genom att tydliggöra att det finns flera olika önsk- värda framtider kan planeringens politiska innehåll synliggöras. Dessa olika framtidsbilder kan utvärderas i termer av miljörättvisa, deras jämställdhets- perspektiv eller någon specifik miljöaspekt som biologisk mångfald. Detta skulle tydliggöra att olika framtider är olika bra för naturen och/eller olika sam- hällsgrupper.

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Preface

It has been fun and a privilege to write this PhD thesis. It has been stimulating for myself, and I hope others will find my research useful as well. At least that has been my driving force. I am passionate about environmental issues and gender equality and hope my research will lead to (at least some small) improvements in planning practice.

I have had the privilege of being a PhD student at the Department of Urban Planning and Development at KTH, working at both the Division of Environ- mental Strategies Research and the Division of Urban and Regional Studies. I had one supervisor from each division: my main supervisor Mattias Höjer and my secondary supervisor Göran Cars. I want to thank you both for your engagement, stimulating discussions and nice (mostly Indian curry) lunches.

There are several people who were important for the development of this thesis. Johan Hedrén, Linköping University, was the discussant at the ‘final seminar’ and also introduced me to Green Futures, while Christine Hudson, Umeå University, was the discussant at the ‘mid-seminar’. Thanks also to Tora Friberg, Linköping University, who participated in the same research project as I and contributed with valuable comments.

I am also grateful to my co-authors: Karin Bradley, Karolina Isaksson, Katarina Larsen and Mattias Höjer. It has been a pleasure working with you.

Karin and Karolina, I have always enjoyed having interesting discussions about research and many more things with you, so it was great to have the opportunity to write a paper together. Katarina, we went to a conference in Naples, we got our idea, we went to Capri and we wrote the paper. That was great.

I have also been lucky to have so many nice colleagues who make all coffee breaks and lunches good moments. We talk about large and small, worldly issues and research and we laugh a lot. Some of you have read and commented on drafts, others have supported me with great encouragement when most needed.

My gratitude also goes to Mary McAfee, who language-checked most of this thesis.

VINNOVA, the Swedish Government Agency for Innovation Systems, and Formas, the Swedish Research Council for Environment, Agricultural Sciences and Spatial Planning, are gratefully acknowledged for providing the funding for the research.

Last, but not least, I am grateful for having family and friends outside the academic world who support me and like doing and talking about different

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things than research. You are many and you mean much. Many of you have been by my side since before 2006 when I started as a PhD student. One of those I love most, however, came late into the picture. In 2009 Robert’s and my child Hjalmar was born. That was the greatest joy ever, and the two of you give me loads of love, laughter and happiness.

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List of papers

I. Bradley, K., Gunnarsson-Östling, U. & Isaksson, K. (2008) Exploring environmental justice in Sweden: How to improve planning for environmental sustainability and social equity in an “eco-friendly” context. Projections: MIT Journal of Planning 8, 68-81.

II. Larsen, K. & Gunnarsson-Östling, U. (2009) Climate change scenarios and citizen-participation: Mitigation and adaptation perspectives in constructing sustainable futures. Habitat International 33, 260-266.

III. Gunnarsson-Östling, U. & Höjer, M. (2011) Scenario planning for sustainability in Stockholm, Sweden: Environmental justice considerations. International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, forthcoming.

IV. Gunnarsson-Östling, U. (2011) Gender in futures: A study of gender and feminist papers published in Futures, 1969-2009. Submitted manuscript.

V. Gunnarsson-Östling, U. (2011) Gendered development and possibilities for alternative feminist futures. Submitted manuscript.

Comments on co-authored papers

Paper I: I wrote this paper together with Karin Bradley and Karolina Isaksson, with all of us contributing to the same extent. We wrote the introduction and conclusion parts together, while Karin took main responsibility for case 1, Karolina for case 2 and I for case 3. However, we all contributed to all parts in constructive ways.

Paper II: I wrote this paper together with Katarina Larsen, who was the main author. I was the main author of section 1. Introduction, and the parts on deliberation and legitimisation in section 2. Scenarios and participating citizens. I was also the main author of the part relating communication to game theory (also in section 2. Scenarios and participating citizens). Katarina and I were equally responsible for section 5. Discussion.

Paper III: I wrote this paper together with Mattias Höjer, but I was the main author for most of the paper. Mattias was the main author for the sub-section

‘Different developments of current suburban shopping nodes’ in the section Analysis. We were equally responsible for the sections Introduction and Conclusions and the sub-section ‘Images of the future’ in the section Stock- holm now and then. We both also contributed to each other’s parts in constructive ways.

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1 Introduction

One major challenge in contemporary research about planning is how to change societies in a more sustainable direction. However, in the last decades of planning research and practice for sustainable urban development, more radical transformations have been rare. Instead, planning for sustainable development is viewed as something that can be achieved within society’s current frames (Bradley, 2009; Keil, 2007). However, futures studies often pro- pose radical changes in terms of technological development and behavioural change to approach sustainable development (see e.g. Åkerman, 2011; Höjer et al., 2011), but social structures such as the vulnerability of different societal groups to environmental problems and gender roles are seldom explicitly analysed. The focus is typically on changing physical or technical aspects, but without asking who should change or highlighting social structures (Wangel, 2011).

The now classic definition of sustainable development can be derived from the report of the World Commission on Environment and Development (1987:14).

It states that: ‘Sustainable development seeks to meet the needs and aspirations of the present without compromising the ability to meet those of the future.’

However, even though sustainable development is often understood as a uniting concept that will resolve tensions between social and economic development along with environmental protection, there are always balances and trade-offs made (Richardson and Connelly, 2003:84). The definition of sustainable development depends on norms and values and rather than one established definition, there are many competing discourses that are sometimes antagonistic and mutually exclusive (Harvey, 1996; Redclift, 2005).

Generally, sustainable development is seen as a ‘good’ thing that few people argue against (Batty, 2001:19). This thesis starts out from the idea that it is not sufficient to state that there are different sustainability discourses around, because depending on how sustainable development is understood, planned and implemented, the consequences for nature and for humans will differ. Such consequences include real issues such as being subject to climate change in terms of e.g. drought and floods or being stigmatised because of gender. When different sustainability discourses are transformed into politics and planning, they affect humans and nature in different ways. Thus, when operationalised, different discourses are not equally ‘good’ for nature and different societal groups. Conceptualising sustainable development involves developing different ways of defining and perceiving nature, theorising on the relationships between humans and nature and also humans and non-human nature, etc. (White, 2008:10). This thesis particularly explores gender and environmental justice discourses in planning for and visioning sustainable development.

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1.1 ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

Over the last three decades, scholars, activists and policymakers have begun to pay attention to the impacts of environmental pollution on disadvantaged communities – they have started to highlight what is now known as environmental justice. Environmental justice, both as a movement and a research field, can be seen as an environmental discourse that puts inequalities at the top of the sustainability agenda (Harvey, 1996). It brings ethical and political questions to the surface (Bullard, 2004:7).

Environmental justice differs from many other environmental discourses by defining the environment as the set of linked places ‘where we live, work and play’ (Turner and Wu, 2002:4). The definition is broad, but it differs from mainstream environmentalism or ‘deep green’ interpretations, which have a more nature-centred world-view (Haughton, 1999:234-235; Turner and Wu, 2002:4). Instead of seeing nature as remote and separated from everyday life, it is seen as the place where human activities of different kinds occur. The background of the concept can be found in studies primarily from the US showing that certain social groups bear a disproportionate burden of environmental problems (see e.g. Bullard, 1990; Harvey, 1996:385 ff). These studies show that disenfranchised, low-income, and/or minority populations are more at risk of being exposed to environmental risks and hazards than other groups.

One starting shot was Robert Bullard’s research on a black community’s battle against a landfill, which he started in 1979. Bullard found that waste dumps in Houston were not randomly scattered throughout the city – instead they were more likely to be located in African American neighbourhoods, particularly near schools (Getches and Pellow, 2002). The findings were published in the article ‘Solid waste sites and the black Houston community’ in 1983. This work later culminated in the book ‘Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class, and Environmental Quality’ (Bullard, 1990). In 1999, the US Institute of Medicine made a review of available scientific literature together with site visits and con- cluded that in the US: ‘there are identifiable communities of concern that experience a certain type of double jeopardy in the sense that they (1) experience higher levels of exposure to environmental stressors in terms of both frequency and magnitude and (2) are less able to deal with these hazards as a result of limited knowledge of exposures and disenfranchisement from the political process’ (Committee on Environmental Justice, 1999:6). Thus, environmental justice began as a concern about the distribution of pollution and hazardous sites among disenfranchised, low-income and/or minority populations. This perspective has since been broadened to include not only the environmental burden, but also environmental benefits and resources, process justice and a concern with the production of unequal outcomes (Walker, 2009).

Much of the research work in the mid-1990s was quantitative, but today it is becoming more cross-disciplinary. Knowledge, representation and meaning are being debated and social theory and diverse methodologies used in investi- gating both the material and political content of socio-environmental concerns

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(Holifield et al., 2009:593). This has also meant that environmental justice must be concerned with several spatial scales, because pollutants move.

Environmental justice is now a well-established field of research, especially in the US and more recently also in the UK, but it is still very limited in a Swedish context (see Papers I and III; Bradley, 2009; Chaix et al., 2006;

Isaksson, 2001 for some exceptions). Recent critical research has underlined the need for contextualising environmental justice (Holifield et al., 2009:596).

This thesis makes a contribution to contextualising environmental justice in Swedish policy, planning and futures studies. It contributes a critical perspective, highlighting that sustainability issues are not only technical issues to be solved by experts, but are also political and concern justice.

1.2 GENDER

A social dimension of sustainable development is gender, which is highlighted by e.g. the People’s Earth Charter (The Earth Charter Initiative, 2000). Simi- larly to environmental justice, gender has become an issue in planning and politics since the late 1970s (Fainstein and Servon, 2005). Gender was first used as a contrast to sex, which means that it describes socially constructed characteristics. Simone de Beauvoir focused on this already in 1949:

One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman. No biological, psychological, or economic fate determines the figure that the human female presents in society; it is civilization as a whole that produces this creature, intermediate between male and eunuch, which is described as feminine. (Beauvoir, 1949/1997:295)

The concept of gender was introduced in order to ‘affirm that of course men and women are ‘different’ in physique and reproductive function, while denying that these differences have any relevance for the opportunities members of the sexes should have or the activities they should engage in’

(Young, 2002:412). Understanding gender as something we do shows that the meaning of femininity and masculinity is something that changes and is renegotiated (Elvin-Nowak and Thomsson, 2003:241). The term doing might suggest that many genders can be created in many ways. However, doing gender in another way than society has agreed upon is difficult.

Even though gender was first used as a contrast to sex, which means that it describes socially constructed characteristics, gender is today often used as a synonym for sex. In addition, much gender research focuses on women, even though gendered roles are created for all humans. Women having been an underrepresented group in planning practice and research can explain this, but it should not be forgotten that we are all (thus, not only women) subject to constructed characteristics.

The gender concern in planning resulted from a broader recognition of difference and marginality. Historically, planners have used a universal tone:

they were planning for the best for all. However, according to Fainstein and

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Servon (2005:3), ‘most of this work assumed a male subject’. Using a gender perspective on planning practice and outcome means that gendered cones- quences of planning can be revealed.

Gender studies in the 1970s were provoked by the positivist research tradition that was excluding not only women, but also women’s experiences. Thus, feminists wanted to create better science by adding women, but also by criticising positivist epistemology and challenging scientific and technical knowledge for not considering the political content of knowledge (Sandercock and Forsyth, 1992:45-46). However, since the 1980s feminist theory has been challenged by women of colour, non-western feminists, gay and lesbian people, postmodern feminists etc. for being universalistic (see e.g. Sandercock and Forsyth, 1992:46-47). In planning theory and futures studies, this criticism suggests that there is a need for developing futures that celebrate differences and plan for multiple publics – not the public. The postmodern critique in- cludes arguments that feminism is diluted because of its focus on diversity, difference, pluralism and abolition of ‘women’ as a relevant category (Rahder and Altilia, 2004:108). The question is also asked as to whether this might be a reason for feminist issues once again disappearing from planning theory and practice. However, Young (2002) suggests that gender is still a relevant category, but for analysing social structures with the purpose of understanding relations of power, opportunities and resource distribution, rather than for making generalisations about men and women. Haug (2000) even claims that

‘the situation of women today is so muddled and patriarchy is so solid, so alive and well, that improvements in the here and now do not suffice’ and calls for more utopian feminism suggesting actual change for today and tomorrow.

Similarly, Little (2007:16) writes that ‘[a]uthors of feminist dystopias need not go beyond historical examples. Their science fiction novels imaginatively mirror actual abominable treatment of women in the past and present: for example, institutionalized maiming, torture, rape, and execution for infidelity’.

Haug (2000) calls for a more future-orientated feminism. The Swedish Research Council Formas also views gender and power as disadvantaged perspectives that need more attention in the research field of socially sustainable urban development (From, 2011:26). This thesis does not restrict itself to criticising contemporary planning and futures studies research and practice, but also suggests ways of improving planning and visioning of sustainable development from a gender and environmental justice perspective. By that it makes a normative contribution, which is unusual, but necessary, for gender research. It also clarifies what a gender perspective can mean in futures studies.

1.3 FUTURES STUDIES PERSPECTIVE

This thesis sees a need not only for critically analysing today’s structures, but also for suggesting alternatives. Therefore, futures studies are used as a lens for

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understanding long-term planning. With its endeavour for change and utopian characteristics, feminist research approaches normative futures studies describing futures where specific targets are met and also discusses how to get there (Börjeson et al., 2006). Similarly, environmental justice is a normative research field striving for change in terms of entitlements, the distribution of environmental goods and bads and procedural justice in processes that make decisions about environmental change.

Futures studies methods such as forecasting and scenario creation are often used in both policy and planning. The futures studies perspective is brought into this thesis as a way to make planning long-term, forward looking and visionary, rather than just solving the most pressing problems. However, futures studies seldom have a gender perspective or a feminist aim (Paper IV).

This thesis helps to bridge this gap. If gender and feminist research have had little influence on futures studies, the traces of environmental justice are even less influential. Even though environmental justice has become such a wide- spread research issue, it has not been a salient feature of futures studies. A search on ScienceDirect (ScienceDirect, 2011) for the terms ‘environmental justice’ together with ‘futures’, ‘futures studies’, ‘utopia’, ‘forecasts’ or

‘scenario’ in titles, abstracts and key words rendered few hits (17, 1, 0, 0 and 2 hits). By bridging the gap between gender/feminist theory and futures studies, and also environmental justice and futures studies, this thesis makes a contribution in revealing underlying assumptions in futures studies and scenarios for sustainable development. It adds a critical perspective and shows that sustainability issues are political and contested.

1.4 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

The overarching aim of this thesis is to contribute new knowledge and deepen existing knowledge on long-term planning for sustainable development through exploring environmental justice and gender discourses in planning and futures studies. The aim is also to suggest ways of working with environmental justice, gender and futures studies perspectives in planning. In doing so, the thesis contributes to planning theory and practice. It contributes to the field of environmental justice through exploring what it could mean in a Swedish context. It contributes to the field of futures studies through adding a gender and environmental justice perspective and through suggesting ways of evaluating the consequences of futures studies on gender and environmental justice.

More specifically, the thesis explores the framing of environmental problems in Swedish policy and planning (Paper I and III), in order to identify consequences of this framing in terms of the issues and impact considered.

This is a way of showing how environmental (in)justice issues can be manifested in a Swedish urban context, but also in scenarios for sustainable urban

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futures. By revealing underlying assumptions in policy, planning and futures studies for sustainable development, political and contested issues can be elucidated. In a similar discursive approach, the framing of gender in Swedish regional planning and in the research field of futures studies is explored (Paper IV and V), in order to determine the consequences of this framing in terms of the issues considered and the futures suggested. Furthermore, the kinds of criticisms directed towards futures studies from a gender/feminist perspective and the reasons for these are examined (Paper V). This meta-study also explores alternative futures studies methods suggested from a gender/feminist perspective and analyses the problems they aim to solve. Further on, it explores how feminist futures are described.

Another recurring theme in this thesis is processes where plans or future scenarios are developed. These kinds of processes are explored in order to identify underlying assumptions affecting planning outcomes (Papers I, II and IV); the voices acknowledged in these processes (Papers I, II, IV and V); who gains and who loses from planning outcomes/scenarios (Papers I, III, IV and V); and how content sustainability is ensured in participatory processes (Papers I, II and III). Paper II also interprets participatory scenario processes as deliberative processes in order to reveal process-content dilemmas. Last but not least, this thesis discusses feasible ways of planning for just, sustainable futures (Papers I-V).

The specific objectives of each study are as follows:

Paper I focuses on planning practice in Stockholm, Sweden. The aim is to show how environmental (in)justices can manifest themselves in a Swedish urban context. This is done through exploring three cases of planning:

municipal promotion of eco-friendly lifestyles, large-scale infrastructure planning and the attitudes of Stockholm City planners towards justice.

Paper II focuses on participatory scenario construction processes for climate change. The aims are twofold, to examine the inter-relationships between adaptation and mitigation and to interpret participatory scenario construction as a deliberative process. This is done through discussing adaptation and mitigation strategies as outlined in climate change scenarios in relation to participants’ views and understanding of vulnerability and resilience and in relation to both content and process values and legitimacy.

Paper III focuses on some proposed future developments for the Stockholm region. The aim is to explore the role scenarios could play regarding local, global, intergenerational and intra-generational justice when planning for sustainable development. This is done through theoretically discussing the relationship between sustainable development and environmental justice, out- lining the environmental justice situation in current Stockholm and analysing the different starting points of four future scenarios, the environmental discourses that they represent, the different processes in which they are de-

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veloped and how they might materialise in a current suburban node of Stock- holm.

Paper IV reviews and discusses papers related to women’s studies, gender or the feminist perspective, published in the scientific journal Futures. The aim is to provide new understandings and remapping of futures studies by capturing how gender is created and understood in this field.

Paper V links long-term planning and futures studies with gender/feminist studies. The aim is to explore long-term plans from a gender and futures perspective. The intention is to deconstruct the multitude of meanings of gender equality by clarifying how different problem representations give rise to different images of the future. This is done through analysing Swedish regional growth agreements from a future studies and feminist perspective.

The findings in this thesis are addressed to, and of relevance for, researchers and practitioners. The target research community is especially futures studies and planning researchers, but also researchers within feminist theory. The target practitioners are especially planners, policymakers and politicians dealing with sustainable development.

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2 Theoretical framework

This chapter places Papers I-V in a scientific context. First, some strands in planning theory are described and then planning is related to futures studies.

When describing planning theory, it is also linked to the concepts of discourse and the real world. Each of the concepts is a huge topic under debate and this chapter should not be seen as an all-embracing literature review, but as an attempt to link Papers I-V to the theory and practice of planning for just, sustainable futures.

2.1 POST-POSITIVIST PLANNING AND FUTURES STUDIES

Modern urban life is carried out in a planned society—planned both up and down. (Perry, 1995:211)

As long as there have been cities, there have been people seeking to ‘perfect the art and science of city-building’ (Sandercock, 2003:1). The planning profession was born out of this vision of the good city (Fainstein, 2006:2).

There has always been a utopian impulse and this was strong around the turn of the nineteenth century, when planners responded to the ills of Western industrialised cities (Sandercock, 2003:2). This utopian and modernist paradigm, based on science and technical reason, dominated planning in the twentieth century. According to Allmendiger (2002:4), planning seen as both practice and thinking has a history ‘that relates to philosophies, epistemologies and theories broadly associated with modernism and positivism’.

Modernist planning has been attacked from many directions and is now crumbling, but ‘there is still no agreement as to what might replace that grand social project’ (Sandercock, 2003:2). Perry (1995) noted back in 1995 that the planning profession is undergoing a crisis and Campbell (2010) even questioned whether those within the planning community still believe in the idea of planning. Similarly, Harris (2002:24-25) relates the crisis to the failure to develop convincing alternatives and Fainstein (2006:2) concludes that planning today is characterised by modesty and that most planners and planning theorists ‘argue that visionaries should not impose their view upon the public’. Much post-positivist planning theory has instead been characterised by criticism of both traditional and postmodern planning (Allmendiger, 2002:13;

Fainstein, 2000:472). The ‘dark’ side of planning has been revealed by authors such as Flyvbjerg (1998/2003) showing that knowledge is power, but also the other way around: power is knowledge. This means that power can determine

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what counts as knowledge and what interpretations are seen as valid. This is typical of the postmodern condition with the belief that there is no universal truth that can be uncovered by universal methods (Oranje, 2002:172). Instead, what is real is seen as constructed through social processes.

Both planning theory and futures studies as research fields have moved from a positivist to a post-positivist epistemology (see e.g. Allmendiger and Tewdwr- Jones, 2002; Bell, 2003, chapter 5). One of the basic epistemological questions concerns the nature of knowledge – how can we know things? The move by planning theory and futures studies from a positivist to a post-positivist epistemology follows the linguistic turn, one of the major developments in Western philosophy during the 20th century. Characteristic of the linguistic turn is the focus on the relationship between knowledge and language (Martinich and Stroll, 2011). The focus on language has made many argue that we cannot have knowledge about the real world because all ‘facts’ are dependent on the human mind – there is no mind-independent reality (Searle, 1995:2, chapter 7). We then approach ontology – the philosophical study of the nature of being, existence or reality as such. Ontology is about finding distinctions between the real and the fictive.

Even though this thesis is inspired by the linguistic turn and uses methods associated with it, it assumes a real world. It recognises power relations as influencing what is seen as good, what is highly valued, what is seen as knowledge, etc., but it also assumes that implementing plans and policies can result in both positive and negative impacts for certain groups. These consequences are actual and can sometimes be measured in terms of noise, contamination of water, women’s travel habits compared with men’s, etc. In addition, many actual consequences exist irrespective of our knowledge and our experiences.

Thus, a person can be negatively affected by pollution irrespective of whether he/she has knowledge about the harmful effects of these pollutants. However, by using a critical and discursive perspective this thesis also acknowledges that what we choose to measure, what we set as minimum standards, what is considered gender equal and what is considered to be sustainable are debatable.

2.2 COMMUNICATIVE PLANNING AND RELATED CRITICISMS

The most significant planning theory that has emerged in the post-positivist landscape is communicative planning, according to Allmendiger (2002:16).

Similarly, Harris (2002:22) denotes collaborative planning as one of the key phrases in the planning theory vocabulary. Healey (1996) even talks about a paradigm shift and notes that new ideas viewing collaboration, public participation and power as important concepts are sweeping over the field.

Orrskog (2002:95) states that these ideas ‘concentrate on the role of planning as an arena for discussions between different private as well as public actors’.

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Communicative, or collaborative, planning is a response to the rational, top- down planning performed by experts (Fainstein, 2000:453). It thus follows the 1990s deliberative strong turn in theory of democracy (Dryzek, 2000). Prior to that turn, democracy was understood in terms of aggregation of preferences through voting and representation. Now, democratic legitimacy is increasingly being seen in terms of giving the opportunity to participate in deliberations to come to collective decisions (Dryzek, 2000).

Collaborative planning is based on the idea that the participants will learn from each other and come to an agreement through the process (Healey, 1997).

Thus, the planning process becomes a consensus-building process with the planner as mediator. Ideal speech becomes the goal of planning and there is an

‘assumption that if only people were reasonable, deep structural conflict would melt away’ (Fainstein, 2000:455). This is a discourse where planning processes are seen as carried out by equal actors (Richardson, 1996).

Writers such as Hendriks et al. (2007) underline the importance of deliberative processes being open and diverse and do not devote as much attention to the outcome. However, critics claim that communicative planning is likely to be vulnerable to different forms of power that can disrupt the process (Richardson, 1996) and that open processes do not necessarily produce just results (Papers I, II and III; Fainstein, 2000:457; Larsen et al., 2011). However, Connelly and Richardson (2009) see effective deliberation as a process where stakeholders are engaged and the primary assessment should be regarding the effectiveness of the process ‘in delivering an intended policy’. They also underline that governance as a whole should be assessed regarding its possibilities to take action and achieve legitimacy, where legitimacy is understood as the reco- gnised right to make policy. There are thus three dimensions that Connelly and Richardson (2009) identify as important: content sustainability, capacity to act and legitimacy. Mouffe (2005) instead criticises the whole idea of dialogic democracy because of its anti-political vision that refuses the antagonistic dimension of the political. She believes that the effort to achieve universal and rational consensus is the wrong track in democratic thought and argues instead that ‘the task for democratic theorists and politicians should be to envisage the creation of a vibrant ‘agonistic’ public sphere of contestation where different hegemonic political projects can be confronted’ (Mouffe, 2005:3). Today, much of the talk about dialogue and deliberation means nothing, since no real choices are at hand, and Mouffe (2005) claims that we are actually living in post-political times. Thinking politically means highlighting that e.g. planning is not just about technical issues that can be solved by experts. There are conflicts without rational solutions and planning involves choosing between conflicting alternatives.

Participatory processes are discussed in Papers I, II and V and to some extent also in Paper III. Paper I reveals that planners in Stockholm view justice issues as solvable by just planning processes. The process is the focus and not the

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content. Thus, the assumption is that the participants will negotiate in an open and fair process and come to a just agreement. However, this approach fails to confront issues related to power. Paper II further problematises participatory processes, but here in the context of creating scenarios handling climate change mitigation and adaptation. Paper II highlights the political dimensions of climate change and concludes that depending on how the participants perceive e.g. vulnerability and resilience, questions of what and when climate measures should be taken become contested. It also points out the risk that a participatory process might deliver an unsustainable outcome when compared with scientific targets about the need e.g. for decreased CO2 emissions. However, if the focus is instead only on the content, the resulting scenario may lack institutional legitimacy. Paper III compares different sustainability scenarios for Stockholm and concludes that scenarios developed by a rather homogeneous group of scientists are much more radical in terms of sustainability targets (large energy use reductions) than the Regional Development Plan. On the other hand, the Regional Development Plan contains more space for deliberation and the result is influenced by many actors. Paper V shows how the power and privilege to formulate what the problem of gender equality is represented to be affects the means as well as the end. Furthermore, the power to formulate the problem and set the agenda locks certain perspectives out of processes, here in the case of Regional Growth Programmes. Specifically, this meant that in two of the three regions examined in depth, gender experts did not feel involved or came very late into the process, when both problems and solutions had already taken shape. Gender equality was viewed as something that could be added to existing programmes. However, this is difficult since a critical gender perspective means questioning accepted knowledge and what is seen as good development.

2.3 NEW URBANISM AS A CLEAR URBAN VISION

Another strand in the leading edge of planning theory is new urbanism (Fainstein, 2000). New urbanism emerged in the USA during the 1990s and aims to recreate the traditional European small-town environments: cities with squares, small streets, sidewalks with space for outdoor cafes and local small traders (Andersson et al., 2005:30). The idea is that urban living can be radically improved and made more authentic by a return to the collective memory of community and vibrant neighbourhoods (Harvey, 1997:1). This should be recaptured by traditional symbols and structures. The movement has gathered stakeholders with differing values and interests: construction companies, city and transport planners, environmental activists and financiers, including such diverse actors as Prince Charles and the Disney Corporation (Andersson et al., 2005:30). It strives for an urban design that includes walka- bility, human scale, mixed use, connectivity, care for the public realm, green design and traditional neighbourhood structure (Congress for the New

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Urbanism). Thus, physical form should contribute to a better environment and social conditions. It is a reaction against urban sprawl, anonymity, car dependence and large-scale modernist urban planning (Andersson et al., 2005:30).

Thus, while the communicative planning strand does not want to set any particular view as being better than any other, new urbanism has a clear urban vision. Sandercock (2003:197) sees this as one of the reasons for the appeal of new urbanism – it tells a story with a happy ending. However, a frequent criticism is that new urbanism ‘merely calls for a different form of suburbia rather than overcoming social segregation’ (Fainstein, 2000:463) and also that it is not sure to overcome car dependency, since many developments have been typically suburban (Harvey, 1997:2). In addition, new urbanism planning is viewed as being mainly addressed to an affluent middle class and creates strong boundaries against the surrounding community (Andersson et al., 2005:31). The idea of creating a strong community can also have a darker side and Harvey (1997:3) writes that ‘community has often been a barrier to rather than facilitator of progressive social change, and much of the populist migration out of villages (both rural and urban) arose precisely because they were oppressive to the human spirit and otiose as a form of sociopolitical organization’.

Keil (2007:56) criticises new urbanism’s attempts to be a solution to sustainable development since ‘they cannot reach deeply enough to fundamentally redirect the destructive dynamics of today’s urbanism’. Keil (2007) highlights today’s ecological crises resulting from global warming and criticises the idea that sustainability can be planned through smart social engineering and urban design. However, Fainstein (2000:465) underlines new urbanism’s utopianism as a contrast to communicative planning that only offers a better process. The new urbanism planner becomes an advocate of better quality of life in nicer surroundings. Even if the benefits are exaggerated, it depicts a different society. Harvey (1997:2) is concerned that new urbanism may ‘perpetuate the idea that the shaping of spatial order is or can be the foundation for a new moral and aesthetic order’. It presupposes that proper design will gain social, economic and political life. In a similar way, Paper III is critical of urban form being the key issue in making cities sustainable.

However, Harvey (1997:3) does not criticise utopianism altogether, but emphasises that both spatial form and process must be considered. New urbanism is not explicitly handled by this thesis, but it is worth some attention because of its utopianism concerning spatial form. It has also garnered attention in the Swedish planning and architecture debate (Andersson et al., 2005).

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2.4 PRESCRIPTIVE POSTMODERN PLANNING

So, one strand in the leading edge of planning theory concerns the usefulness of communicative rationality and another disagreement is about urban design’s effect on social outcomes. The third strand pointed out by Fainstein (2000) concerns both process and outcome and is denoted the Just City approach.

Similarly, Campbell (2010) highlights the need for envisioning alternatives in an Editorial to Planning Theory & Practice:

It is all too easy to identify obstacles and constraints, reasons why failure is inevitable. However, this is a moment in which we as planners need to focus attention on our capacities to envisage alternatives and demonstrate the possibilities for a better world. (Campbell, 2010:475)

Campbell (2010:473) states that planners and planning theorists cannot continue to blame others for the failings and inadequacies of planning and that the future is their responsibility.

Even if most post-positivist planning theory does not offer concrete appealing suggestions, there is some more prescriptive postmodern planning calling for politicised definitions of planning or even suggesting alternative visions (see e.g. Allmendiger, 2002; Bradley, 2009; Fainstein, 2000; Oranje, 2002). Since this thesis explores environmental justice and gender discourses in planning and futures studies and looks for ways of working with those issues, a critical perspective is necessary, but also a more normative approach.

By suggesting the Just City approach, Fainstein (2000; 2006; 2009; 2010) falls within the more prescriptive postmodern tradition. The Just City approach is a

‘normative position concerning the distribution of social benefits’ (Fainstein, 2000:467). It highlights process values and desirable outcomes. Thus, it recognises that just processes do not necessarily result in just outcomes, an issue which is also discussed in Papers I, II and III. Paper V exemplifies the issue using the Swedish Regional Growth Programmes and shows how gender experts can sometimes be locked out of the processes. Campbell (2010:472) also emphasises values and better outcomes and writes that planners and planning theorists ‘have to be able to articulate our underlying values and demonstrate the beneficial outcomes which result’. This is a move away from the tradition of merely criticising urban and regional phenomena and instead trying to ‘specify the nature of a good city’ (Fainstein, 2000:467).

In the view of Fainstein (2000; 2006; 2009; 2010), the purpose is to recommend nonreformist reforms and thus improvements should be made within the current structures. Fainstein (2010:20) denotes this as a form of

‘realistic utopianism’. The goal is to approach just cities with equity, democracy and diversity as the three primary qualities. Thus, ‘[t]he discussion does not go so far as to investigate the broader concept of the good city’ (Fainstein, 2010:58) and e.g. environmental issues are not considered. Policy recommendations are e.g. that ‘new housing development should provide units for house- holds with incomes below the median’ (Fainstein, 2010:172), ‘megaprojects

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should be scrutinised on their benefits for low-income people, planners should be active deliberators pressing for egalitarian solutions’ (Fainstein, 2010:173),

‘[b]oundaries between districts should be porous’ (Fainstein, 2010:174) and

‘[g]roups that are not able to participate directly in decision-making processes should be represented by advocates’ (Fainstein, 2010:175).

Harvey (2009) is critical towards the approach of acting within the capitalist regime and questions capital accumulation and economic growth as prime targets in city development. He claims that the question of what city we desire is inseparable from what kind of people we want to become (Harvey, 2009:45).

However, he also underlines that ‘[a] static endpoint is not desirable’ and that

‘a Just City has to be about fierce conflict all of the time’ (Harvey, 2009:47).

Sandercock (2003:2) also underlines dynamics and wants ‘to practice utopia, a city politics of possibility and hope’ and therefore wants to outline a utopian, critical, creative and audacious planning imagination. The goal is a multicultural city where diversity is accepted. Diversity, democracy and social justice are seen as important values in her call for Cosmopolis. This future is truly multicultural and is characterised by the acceptance of all people having a cultural identity (which is not static, but always evolving).

Researchers within the field of political ecology have also called for alternatives. Swyngedouw (2007) sees the need for imagining and naming socioenvironmental futures and Keil (2007:57) notes that radical change is needed and proposes a radical urban political ecology, meaning that sustainability cannot be achieved within capitalism as we know it.

2.5 NORMATIVE IMAGES OF THE FUTURE

The planning types described in the sections above are not all-embracing, but they represent a move away from a purely critical perspective. They are examples of attempts at providing a guiding ethic in a postmodern time. This thesis adopts a critical perspective and also suggests ways for more environ- mentally just and gender aware long-term planning practice. Thus, it follows both a postmodern critical tradition (but acknowledges a real world) and draws on ideas from the prescriptive postmodern planning approach. In describing desirable futures, the prescriptive postmodern planning approach comes near to futures studies, especially the branch of futures studies where images of the future are developed.

As Paper V notes, even though people have always been thinking of the future, futures studies as an academic field only rose in the mid-1960s (Andersson, 2006; Bell, 2003:279, chapter 1). The plural term ‘futures’ highlights that the future is uncertain and opens the way for several future visions or stories about the future. In addition, as described in Paper III, futures studies do not regard the future as a disconnected end-state, but rather as rooted in both the past and

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the present (Bell, 2003; Koselleck, 1979/2004; Myers and Kitsuse, 2000). This means that there are some future events that we can be certain about (that we can predict), but also that the future is socially constructed. Futures studies is one way of dealing with uncertainty (Svenfelt, 2010). Myers and Kituse (2000:225) express this as the future having ‘past, present, and future components’.

Another way of stating this is that images of the future will inevitably bear traces of yesterday as well as today’s zeitgeist. Simonsen (2005) and Orrskog (2005) are two of many writers in the field of geography/planning showing that the dominant stories about today’s and tomorrow’s city tend to be rather streamlined. However, there are also challenging stories presenting alternative solutions. There are real, possible, dreamed and forgotten visions about the city (Orrskog, 2005:29).

The field of futures studies is characterised by plurality regarding research approaches and one way of classifying those different approaches is that they respond to one of the three questions ‘what will happen’, ‘what can happen’

and ‘how can a specific target be reached’. They thereby belong to the three categories predictive, explorative and normative scenarios (Börjeson et al., 2006).

The prescriptive postmodern planning approach resembles most normative scenarios. These in turn can be divided into preserving and transforming scenarios, where preserving scenarios depict images of the future built on today’s societal structures (Börjeson et al., 2006:728-729). In transforming scenarios the goals are seen as very difficult to reach within today’s structures and major societal changes are therefore seen as necessary.

One form of transforming scenario studies is backcasting. Robinson (1990:822) writes that ‘[t]he major distinguishing characteristic of backcasting analyses is a concern, not with what futures are likely to happen, but with how desirable futures can be attained’. Dreborg (1996:814) states that backcasting is especially useful for ‘long-term complex issues, involving many aspects of society as well as technological innovations and change’. The focus is on issues perceived as societal problems of great importance and its commonly used for describing low-energy futures (Dreborg, 1996). The approach is to involve many actors and one ‘important aim of backcasting studies, in the Swedish tradition is, accordingly, to provide different actors in society with a better foundation for discussing goals and taking decisions-to act or to seek further knowledge’ (Dreborg, 1996:824).

Backcasting studies often come up with new and unconventional solutions to societal problems, which have made objectors claim it is political rather than scientific. However, Dreborg (1996:825) underlines that ‘solutions conforming to business as usual are seldom regarded as political’ since they are in line with the habitual way of thinking and therefore their value dependence is just less

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apparent. He also underlines the importance of describing value-related considerations lying behind images of the future and points out that backcasting studies can provide a set of different images of the future, based on different norms and values, which can facilitate different societal groups to grasp the issues at stake. Typically, the focus of backcasting studies is on changing physical or technical aspects, but without asking who should change or highlighting social structures (Wangel, 2011).

Planning is most often not so transforming in its nature, but can rather be seen as a form of preserving normative scenario work, since it often starts out with a set of targets concerning environmental, social, economic and cultural factors to reach within current structures (Börjeson et al., 2006:728).

This thesis (especially Papers III, IV and V) highlights normative scenarios as a way of clarifying political dimensions of planning and visioning about sustainable futures. They can be a way of depicting antagonistic futures.

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3 Methodology

This chapter describes the scientific approach used in this thesis. It also presents the scientific methods used in Papers I-V for assembling and analysing data.

3.1 SCIENTIFIC APPROACH

This thesis is inspired by the linguistic turn and uses methods associated with it. The questions posed do not mainly strive to tell how much, but also what character something has (Johansson, 2003:90). The research methods used are mainly qualitative. Qualitative methods aim to find the meaning of texts, symbols, etc. Limb and Dwyer (2001:6) state that perhaps the most important aspect of qualitative methodologies is that they do not assume ‘that there is a pre-existing world that can be known, or measured, but instead see the social world as something that is dynamic and changing, always being constructed through the intersection of cultural, economic, social and political processes.’

Thus, according to Limb and Dwyer (2001:6-7) there is no ‘real’ world out there to be discovered. However, this is not something that applies to all postmodernists. For example, Hansen and Simonsen (2004:138-139) ask themselves whether critical realism and social constructivism are necessarily antagonist. One can ask what is actually constructed in the constructivist view.

Is it the conception of reality, or the reality itself? Who is constructing? And how? They argue that seeing scientific concepts as influenced by both reality and social factors is a form of critical realism or moderate constructivism (Hansen and Simonsen, 2004:139-141).

Bacchi (1999:42-43) also questions the total relativism and raises two important questions: ‘Is the turn to the construction of meaning a gospel of despair? Or, is it possible to retain insights into the construction of meaning while endorsing programmes of political change?’ She identifies two groups,

‘affirmative’ and ‘sceptical’ postmodernists, where the first group is committed to political activities while the latter takes a purely relativistic standpoint.

Feminists viewing policy as discourse are thus generally affirmative postmodernists – they have an agenda for change. ‘Sceptical postmodernists […] dismiss policy recommendations’ (Bacchi, 1999:43). Any interpretation is as good as any other. Bacchi (1999:43, 54) underlines that it is possible to take a discursive perspective but still want change, as the affirmative postmodernists. One should then emphasise the implications that follow from particular representations or interpretations. These implications affect people’s lives.

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This thesis is inspired by the linguistic turn in seeing social categories, patterns of actions and social institutions as constructed by history and culture, in which language plays an important role. Thus, the thesis sees the social world as socially constructed, what else would it be? However, both ‘social facts’ and

‘brute facts’ can be true or false and they can change (Searle, 1995).

Starting out from a critical realist position means that there is a real world consisting of both natural and social facts. The scientific way to describe the physical world and its limits is e.g. through climate change (International Panel on Climate Change, 2007) and ecosystems (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Panel, 2005), which are part of nine suggested planetary boundaries¹ within which humanity can continue to operate safely without the risk of abrupt environmental change (Rockström et al., 2009). These are ways of describing that natural resources are not unlimited, another example being to talk about the carrying capacity of nature (Arrow et al., 1995). Thus, the physical world limits what we can do through e.g. geographical settings.

However, the physical world is not static. The forest looks different after a storm than before, mountains erode, rivers meanders through the landscape, the construction of fields, roads and cities changes the landscape, etc.

The starting point of seeing the world as constituted by both natural and social facts is described in Paper I as understanding ‘sustainable development as focusing both on protecting the resource base and enhancing social justice, and – not least – on the connection between the two’ (Paper I: 70). The connection is pointed out as ‘how natural resources are distributed, how decisions affecting the environment are made, and how environmental qualities are defined’

(Paper I: 70). Thus, Paper I starts out from viewing environmental problems as real, but also shows that the effects of environmental degradation impact differently on different societal groups and that there are different opinions and interpretations of what e.g. constitutes the most important environmental problems.

Paper II describes climate change effects that cause real effects on humans and nature in several ways, e.g. that cities are ‘vulnerable to climate change that can give rise to inundation of large delta areas, saltwater moving upstream into freshwater rivers, uncontrolled air pollution, typhoons, floods and so forth’

(Paper II: 260). However, it also takes into account that people have different preferences, accept different policies, see different environmental problems as important, etc. Thus, it is concerned with natural as well as social facts.

1 Seven of these are quantified: climate change (CO₂ concentration in the atmosphere), ocean acidification, stratospheric ozone, biogeochemical nitrogen (N) cycle and phosphorus (P) cycle, global freshwater use, land system change and the rate at which biological diversity is lost. The two additional planetary boundaries are chemical pollution and atmospheric aerosol loading.

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In Paper III the physical limits are expressed as seeing ‘that the carrying capacity of nature is not unlimited²’ (Paper III: 3), but also through seeing social and ecological systems as interlinked. Paper III also demonstrates social facts in the form of different environmental discourses.

Papers IV and V take a discursive perspective and focus on texts and spoken words. They concentrate on social facts, but see that those social facts (e.g.

plans, policies and futures studies) have real consequences on humans when implemented and that the consequences are somewhat different for women and men.

In Paper V people were interviewed about e.g. how they experienced the process where the Regional Growth Programmes were developed. The attitudes, thoughts and feelings of these interviewees are subjective in an onto- logical sense, but we can make objectively true or false statements about them.

For example, when one of the gender experts reported that she felt rejected, Paper V makes a true statement about her feeling, even if there are other people that experienced the same process in different ways.

Paper IV is not only a discourse analysis, but also a meta-study of earlier attempts to integrate a gender/feminist perspective in futures studies. Thus, it is a study of how gender has been done in futures studies. In similar ways as nature can limit what humans can or cannot do, social institutions and facts set limits through e.g. expectations, laws and educational systems. There are different discourses in society with different interpretations of e.g. what are seen as acute environmental problems and what is the ‘right’ way for women and men to behave. However, this does not mean that e.g. climate change and air pollution are only in the eye of the beholder; these environmental problems have real consequences on nature and on humans. Furthermore, it does not mean that e.g. women’s and men’s different travel behaviours or different wages are just in the eye of the beholder. When deciding what constitutes e.g.

vulnerability and what is the political action to be taken, we are making valuations.

3.2 ASSEMBLING DATA

The data on which this thesis is based were collected through literature reviews, through screening the planning and futures studies field for relevant cases and through different kinds of interviews. Interviews were conducted for Paper I (individual in-depth interviews) and Paper V (group or informal conversational interviews).

2 Carrying capacity should not be seen as fixed or static, however; it is contingent on technology, preferences and the structure of production and consumption (Arrow et al., 1995).

Just Sustainable Futures